STAFF CONTACT

LEGISLATIVE UPDATES

Beginning January 1, 2015, large companies (classified as
having over 100 full time employees) will face penalties if they fail to offer
health plans to full-time employees.Companies
that have between 50 and 99 full-time-equivalent employees have another year to
prepare for the employer mandate, but must still comply with the employer
reporting requirements in 2015.The
transition relief for these employers through 2015 applies as long as they meet
certain conditions, including not cutting back employees' hours or positions in
2015 to keep the business under the 100-FTE employee threshold.

To avoid penalties,
applicable large employers must offer health care coverage to full-time
employees and their dependents. The ACA defines full-time as a person with at
least 130 hours of service in any given month, or averaging 30 hours of service
a week.

Employers with more
than one business entity may need to consider all their employees as one group
to determine if they meet the 100- or 50-FTE employee thresholds. Consult your
tax adviser for details.

To measure the size of
their workforce, employers can use transition-relief provisions in the ACA
regulations and look at any consecutive six-month period in 2014 to see if they
meet the 100-FTE-employee threshold that triggers "applicable large employer"
status for 2015.

If your business
intends to use the ACA's "seasonal worker exception" to qualify for an
exemption from large-employer status for 2015, you must look at employment over
all 12 months of 2014.

Treasury Department
regulations go into extensive detail about how employers should measure whether
new employees, seasonal employees and employees whose hours vary from month to
month are considered full-time. Restaurant.org/Healthcare offers links to the regulations.

Employers with 50 or
more employees will be required to file their first information returns with
the IRS and statements with employees in early 2016, based on data tracked in
2015.